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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29502588">Of worship and war</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merakkli/pseuds/Merakkli'>Merakkli</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity (Video Game), The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Jewish tradition if you squint, Marriage, Older Characters, Post-Canon, its all i know, or implications of marriage at least</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-16 01:41:15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,303</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29502588</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merakkli/pseuds/Merakkli</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Years after the calamity was sealed, Hyrule is still recovering. Redwood seeds will only sprout in the midst of wildfire; life will always bloom in the heart of death.<br/>Mipha and Zelda meet in mutual joy and grief for a world that collapsed in on itself when they chose each other.<br/>Revali and Link are forced into a ballroom. They can’t stay on opposing walls for long.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Link/Revali (Legend of Zelda), Mipha/Zelda (Legend of Zelda)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>21</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Of worship and war</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=udog">udog</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>If nothing else, the land around Hyrule Castle remains beautiful. The rising sun cuts through the night's fog like a dagger. It lights the mist on fire around Zelda, burning the colors of the newborn sky. Hyrule Castle itself is what blots out the sunrise. The stone is so dark it looks more like a shade than a building, a phantom of what it used to be. Its color will return when the sun rises fully, but for now whatever beauty it holds is lost on her.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The air in the sanctum is so often stifling. She wishes she had the words to appreciate the servants who opened the few windows at the very peak of the room. The resulting wind just barely ruffles the banners in the steadily growing ceremony space.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Hyrule Castle is peaceful, quiet, and utterly unreal. Zelda steps into the main hall and is reminded of a photograph on her Sheikah Slate, not a wedding venue and certainly not a </span>
  <em>
    <span>home</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The interior is dim. It never had been, prior to the Calamity. Through the newly-woven fineries and freshly cut slate, it seems nobody had bothered to pay for lanterns that lasted longer than a few hours. Zelda can't bring herself to feel bitter about it--hardly anyone but the servants stay in the castle for long, and they were already sent into a fright over the arrival of their queen.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Their </span>
  <em>
    <span>queen</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Even if it is soon to be one of two.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Zelda doesn't look at the walls of her old room. She hardly even glances at the nearby mirror. It had been polished some time ago but all it's been doing since then is collecting dust, and now it just muddies her reflection. She ignores it all and picks up the dress on the quilted bed as unfeelingly as she can.  </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The draperies in her old quarters are thick and bleached with dust. She should be spending more time here now that it’s been fully repaired, something about making a statement to the rest of the castle that everything is--or will soon be--back in good health, but she has never felt comfortable here. The spiderweb cracks in the rapid work done to repair the walls on her room is still enough to warp the strings of her dress with her grip on them.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There are still scars from the monsters and guardians plaguing the walls. Not in here, everyone cared far too much about her room for that. But they were, once, and the slashes of guardian's talons are still burned into each corridor. Zelda has waited for the marks to fade, has tried to scrub them out herself, but the stone comes away dark with ash each time. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She rubs a finger over the calluses on the meat of her palms and risks looking at herself in the mirror. The dust on the surface catches the minimal light in the room, almost worse than a glare might, and no matter which way she turns she can't see the laces at the back. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It might have been a mistake to hold the ceremony in Hyrule Castle. Perhaps the champions can detach themselves from it--and truly, that is what she wants for them--but Zelda knows the ghosts in the halls by name, by profession, by the way they held their spears or folded her sheets. She looks to the gardens and hears the blasts she thought had killed her father. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It might be tolerable if Link were here. But he isn't and Zelda can't be certain he'll ever come. He had been more than a little distressed to hear that her marriage would be held in the Sanctum. She had sworn to him that it wouldn’t be nearly so long as he’d seemed to think, and promised to show him all the exits available ahead of time. He hadn't looked comforted at all, but he had nodded slowly and stared holes into her back while she left the room.  </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The sunlight filtering through the divide in the curtains makes a sliver of the dress glow gold. It offers some semblance of an emotion she's missed since the calamity. Zelda longs to see the plants left behind in her study, but she can hardly go get them at the moment. The bodice is far too tight on her, and it’s been cleaned so thoroughly that she would only feel worse to get dirt on it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It's still so early that there won't be much activity in the castle, at least. She'd woken up an hour and a half before the sunrise, just as she had used to. The champions likely won't be awake for a few hours yet, and few of their hands are good with laces. The reflection in the mirror is uncomfortable, uncertain. At least it's </span>
  <em>
    <span>there</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She's never had to do this before. She's never had a servant, or goddess-forbid a </span>
  <em>
    <span>knight</span>
  </em>
  <span> that wasn't standing behind her. Zelda isn't even certain she's had to tie this kind of dress before. At least the feeling is starting to be the norm. At least the pain of it is something she's learned she can bear. If the whole world is pushing against her, at least she knows how to shove back.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The damned bodice is pushing against her too. It doesn't look good, it's just compressing her stomach. She shouldn't be having so much trouble breathing. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Or maybe the air is just stale, and giving her back memories she shouldn't be having. To open the window would mean to part the curtains, to awaken that terrible cloud of dust. She looks to the drapery--looks away again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And dust aside, the darkness is often more of a comfort to her than the light. She knows shadows like the back of her hand. The light holds a power she thought she wanted to understand, once. Perhaps the Calamity twisted her more than she'd realized, for her to see the darkness as her source of comfort.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>(Maybe because in another life, another time, it was her shroud.)</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There is a time for those sorts of thoughts and it's not </span>
  <em>
    <span>now</span>
  </em>
  <span>, the day of her own </span>
  <em>
    <span>wedding</span>
  </em>
  <span>, and certainly not when she hears the knocking at the door. Someone is awake--two people, if the panicked voice of a servant is anything to go by. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The door opens with a low creak and Mipha sweeps into the room. The voice of the maid cuts off when she closes it behind her, straightening slowly once she's through the doorway. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The sight of her having grown so tall in such a short time had first brought Zelda only a maddening wave of grief for a reason she still doesn’t quite understand. She had taken to it anyway the first time Mipha had pulled her into her arms.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There was a time, one she remembers, where Mipha could whisper into any meeting in the castle and no one would look her way until the gentle clinks of her jewelry alerted them. She hardly keeps that same presence now, all ruby scales and lithe, dangerous beauty. A rare taste, one of Zelda's own suitors had once said. She had fought the urge to scoff. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Rare like what? A rattlesnake? Be careful where you step, then.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"It's early for you," Zelda says, cursing herself the moment it leaves her mouth. There is a way to greet her future wife and that is </span>
  <em>
    <span>not</span>
  </em>
  <span> it. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Mipha gives no indication of minding. Her lips tighten imperceptibly as she looks around the room, gaze falling back on Zelda. When she says nothing Zelda laughs nervously, but it comes out more of a wheeze around the bodice.  </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"I'm afraid I don't have much to offer you. I won’t be presentable for another few hours, and we may have to postpone the wedding for this awful thing.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Mipha smiles, dim light catching her amber eyes just so, and Zelda knows everything is okay. She relaxes as best she can. She hears Mipha sigh softly as she steps closer, turning her face to the mirror when she’s finally standing behind her.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The shawl Zelda had made so long ago is far too small for Mipha now, and the blue is fading into the embroidered white of the pattern anyway. Zelda can see its reflection in the mirror bundled up in her hands, carefully worked around her claws. She takes a final step forward, setting it gently on the desk holding up the mirror. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"Your bodice is..."</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"Terribly done, I'm aware," Zelda sighs, tugging far too hard on the string in her hand.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"Tangled," Mipha finishes, and Zelda can already hear the laughter brimming in her voice. Her hands are cold when she takes Zelda's in her own and rests them at her stomach instead of her back. Moments later, the gentle scrape of her claws comes as she slowly undoes each cross of the laces. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I’d have managed it eventually, if I had enough time,” Zelda says, more crossly than she means it to sound. Mipha hums her response, but the laces of the bodice still tickle her back while she unwinds them. They snag on something invisible to Zelda and she hears gentle laughter behind her.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"You might have asked someone in the castle for help," she says, pulling the final hooks apart and tying them back together at the bottom. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"I wasn't aware I needed to. I've put on my own dresses before." </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I could not call a wedding dress a work outfit, your majesty. There are servants you might know just outside.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Zelda shudders and she knows Mipha notices. She might have made a point of staying as far away from the castle as possible, but she knows she will never shake the memories of living as she once had. It's almost worse than all these memories of war.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Red and cream scales blot out the muddled image of herself in the mirror as Mipha circles her, gentle fingers tracing the lining of the bodice. She tugs it up a little, adjusts where it lies at her hips, and leans down until their eyes can meet. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Or you may have me,” she concedes.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I much prefer that,” Zelda says, weakly like the bodice is still choking her. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Her face is so perfectly framed by her jewelry. It matches her eyes particularly well today, or perhaps just against the maroon of the interior carpets. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>When Mipha leaves her side, it’s to go to the windows and throw the curtains open. Zelda winces against the outpouring of light, doubly so against the swell of dust that follows. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You can see the sunrise from here,” is all she says before she returns to Zelda’s back and picks up the laces where she left off. The bodice tightens slowly, awash in the light of the strengthening dawn.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The dress itself looks awfully similar to one she would wear to any other formal event. The thin train pools around her legs, but the skirt of it is so smooth it clings to her legs and nearly seamless. She had to request the lace sleeves to be sewn onto it, and even then they aren’t nearly so loose around her wrists as she’s used to. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Mipha ties the final knot, and Zelda lets herself breathe out. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I would expect...my bride to be giddier in the final hours before her wedding,” Mipha says slowly, hands coming up to rest on her shoulders.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Perhaps I should be.” After all, it isn’t for lack of trying. “I fear how Hyrule will look at you. Look at us. I love you more than anything. If I could force them all to stay away from us, I would.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Do you remember years ago, when you were praying in that spring, and Urbosa had to pull you out?” Zelda flushes but nods, tilting her head when Mipha brushes a stray hair out of her face. “Zora are well-built to withstand those sorts of temperatures.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She holds Mipha’s hands tight in her own, looking towards the window.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I have always envied that, about your kind,” she murmurs, bringing both of them over her collarbones. Mipha hums, more of a laugh than a sigh, and pulls away again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“When they look, let them. I will stay by your side the whole way through.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Did you come here to make promises to me?” Promises Zelda knows she would risk her life to keep. It makes her sicker than the idea of stepping into the gazes of the hundreds of people who will watch her take her bride.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I came here for you, your majesty. To look upon you, and to hear you speak before anyone else could hear the vows we would share together.” Zelda doesn’t respond, and again Mipha pays it no heed with only a flicker of tension to mar the hope she wears so freely. “The war was great, but it is over, and we are standing with the victors. If the calamity haunts you, allow me to ease your burden.” Her hands are so smooth and so cool when she lifts one of Zelda’s as daintily as a heron might catch a fish, unconditionally, unflinchingly, and eases it to her lips.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Zelda’s next breath shakes unfairly, and she presses her free hand to the bodice as if to rebuke it. She knows it is no longer its fault. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I know very few things about it, but I know it started with me. I held the calamity in the palm of my hand. I could crush it or let it fester." Somewhere between them in the air, she says, there was a life where I nursed it in me. It seems impossible that it wasn't ever this one. I thought of you each time I had to put it down, to cripple it before it consumed me. I have nightmares about when it won, that the day we fought together in Vah Ruta I was gods-know-where drowning in red and you had a spear in your heart.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"And you found yourself presented with a choice," Mipha says, instead of all that </span>
  <em>
    <span>mess</span>
  </em>
  <span>. She's at her back again, testing the laces of her dress a final time. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"I chose you," Zelda says, and pushes the thoughts of blood and glowing weapons from her mind. "I will always choose you." </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The dress moves with her when she takes a slow step forward, picking up the faded blue fabric of her old shawl. She turns and hands it to Mipha slowly, like a sharper move will tear it. She takes it with the same false sense of reverence.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“And what about you?” She asks, drawing her hands away. Mipha’s smile grows tighter, and she steps back a single pace. Zelda follows her and she notices, like she always does.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I would think that there was a time for sharing my worries, and it wouldn’t be while I was in the middle of comforting my lover.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Mipha. It's not sensible to hold your own wedding unhappy." </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The look on Mipha’s face says many things, all and none of which Zelda has admitted. She purses her lips and steps behind her instead of holding her gaze, bundling up the train of her dress when it catches at her feet.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“My father was...conflicted about our union,” she says finally, bowing her head as though it’s shameful to her. “He feared you the day you came to offer me my position as pilot of Vah Ruta. He fears you now, in much the same manner.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Zelda loses her grasp on words for a moment, but the gentle huff of laughter from Mipha--as though she can sense her indignance--is enough to make her lower her shoulders. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“The day I led you to pilot Vah Ruta,”  she says, carefully like each word is testing her tongue. “You shot his certain death out of the sky. Did he not think of everything we have done together? Everything we could do </span>
  <em>
    <span>now</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Mipha leans just a little, staring down her reflection in the mirror. Zelda steps forward and wipes away a fraction of the dust settled on it, just enough to cut a clear streak through her and Mipha’s faces. She can see the tawny of her eyes from here, and the way they flicker away once Zelda turns back to her. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She bundles up the old shawl close to her face, closing her eyes when Zelda brings a hand up to toy with the jewelry draped over her shoulder fins. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You have told me about your visions before, though you don’t often know it when you do. Sometimes I feel like he can see them, too. He worries, and after everything...I have no right to ask him not to.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It is </span>
  <em>
    <span>your</span>
  </em>
  <span> responsibility to keep yourself away from war, not his.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Her eyes open by just a sliver, and enough of her face is still uncovered that Zelda can see the smile on her cheeks.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“And yet, I find myself missing the times I caused more wounds than healed them.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Or the look in your kingdom’s eyes when you returned home covered in someone else’s blood,” Zelda says, and Mipha laughs into the fabric. “They stared for so long at the magic in one hand, they forgot about the trident in the other. Well, why shouldn’t you prove them wrong?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You underestimate the will of my people, your majesty,” she says, joy fading incrementally as she looks away again. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Within the day we will be queens, ruling over Hyrule together. I will be your people. You will be mine.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Zelda knows which way to pet down her scales so that they run smooth instead of sharp, and Mipha leans into her touch when she pets gently down her arm. “You fear this just as much as I do, I assume. When you say you will stand by my side, am I not to do the same?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The sound Mipha makes exists in the space between a hum and the beginning of a sentence--something like a sob in the back of her throat. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Maybe we do share similar fears. In some other world, I was not enough for those I loved. I did all that I could to protect them, and </span>
  <em>
    <span>still</span>
  </em>
  <span> I failed. I could not help my family, and you are my family now--I could not bear to know I hurt you as well through my own inaction.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Zelda trails her fingers over her scales and removes them completely, stepping back so she can look her in the eyes. “We both fear something that never came to pass, and something that never will. Do you think only I am worth helping?” She circles around her once more, far enough to see the muscles of her back tense when she speaks.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Very well. I pulled a spear from my little brother’s hands and a month later he stood over me, holding my own. How was I to feel about that? I saw the grief in his eyes when he looked at me. I knew perfectly well why he followed that light he spoke of.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“So you wish he hadn’t,” Zelda says, and Mipha’s hands still against the fabric of the shawl. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I wish for him to heal. I fear he has...seen things I dare not comprehend, and I fear I ripped his heart in two a second time.” She pauses for only a moment more, and then her soft smile is back as Zelda comes to her front again. “I hope that if he were to look to us right now, he would be happy.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Mipha is so large, and her hands barely fit in Zelda’s own when she takes them and squeezes them hard. She’s almost as tall as Sidon had been, if not taller. Where he had been loud and full of danger, bared to the heavens as though he had nothing left to lose, Mipha...holds herself back. A subtle kind of predatory, unnoticed until you were close enough to see the glint of her teeth, and an easy sort of kindness in the way she tucks her claws into her palms when Zelda holds her tighter.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You will be different from whatever he had then,” she says softly, “you will be everything you can give to him. He will love you, and he will grow to be like you. It will be </span>
  <em>
    <span>beautiful</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Mipha. Trust in him and in yourself.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Something glints in Mipha’s eyes that Zelda doesn’t know how to interpret or react to, but she’s still smiling and watching her with some foreign emotion that turns the space around her heart weak. If she’s blushing when she breaks and looks to her fins instead of her eyes, she ignores it. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Mipha's smile grows bemused, and Zelda steadfastly ignores that, too. Instead, she reaches out to touch some of the jewelry dripping down her fins. It turns her fingers numb the closer she gets, pins and needles erupting through her fingers the moment she touches the metal. "Topaz," Zelda scoffs, letting it go and rubbing at her hand. "It's like they think this is an assassination attempt, not a wedding. Surely that hurts, to wear so much." </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She circles around her to the desk and tugs open the drawer beneath it. It sends a slight cloud of dust into her face, and she has to squint while she rifles through the old jewelry. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Her collection isn’t tarnished so much as it is...dim. Perhaps it always was, and Zelda had never noticed. She finds herself wishing she had a polishing cloth on hand. The bracelet she finds is more gem than metal, thin on both sides and swelling around a large teardrop in the center. The rest of the stones form a crowded pattern around it. Diamond, however dyed blue it may have been, is functionally useless now that the guardians have all gone dormant. She keeps it for a reason she doesn’t have the words to articulate--as a memory, a gravestone, a scrapbook.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It’s Zelda that reaches to undo the side of her headpiece, not Mipha. She does it with halting movements, waiting for any subtle command for her to stop. One never comes, and she ignores the burning in her fingertips as she lays the side piece neatly on her table.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It won’t fit with the rest of your jewelry,” she says, with an overwhelming wave of shyness as she offers the bracelet to her. Rather than take it, Mipha leans down and presses the hand that holds the bracelet to her fin. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It will be yours,” she says, and stays still while Zelda hooks the clasp into the headpiece curling around her tail. It drapes over her fin oddly when she stands back up, pulling regrettably away from Zelda’s hands. The clasp isn’t made for this kind of presentation, and it smacks into her fin with every movement she makes. She still brings a hand to her head with a wide smile, as though it suits her better than any piece of jewelry yet. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I was certain something was missing when I left my quarters this morning,” she says, her voice almost trembling with restrained joy. She circles around Zelda one last time, draping the cloth of her old shawl around her hair like a veil and tugging her closer. She squeaks through her giggles but doesn’t pull away from the lips against her cheek, the breath against her face from Mipha’s mutual laughter.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She keeps the shawl tucked close around her shoulders, even when Mipha releases her. They aren’t parted for long--her voice breaks in a squeal when she takes her by the knees and back, swinging her into her arms with a sparkling flurry of Zelda’s gossamer train. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Have I made a mistake in giving that back to you?” She asks in a voice that peals like gentle bells, tickling the hair by Zelda’s ears. She squirms and laughs with her, pulling it closer over her chest.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It’s of no use to you anymore, the same as that jewelry--and truly, is that not what marriage is about?” Mipha huffs and sits Zelda higher up on her arms, tucking her blunted crest into the worn fabric.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I quite like it, your majesty. The stitching was so messy, I always wondered if you were angry at the cloth.” She must have meant for Zelda to laugh harder, and she does, because it was true. She had longed so achingly to make one for herself, and she clings to it now as though it was gifted to her for the same ceremony all those years ago--when the sanctum was yet another room and the biggest threat she had faced was the clenching of her father’s hand.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The sun has risen fully now, but it is not yet at its zenith. Regardless, Zelda knows that the castle has awakened with it. She can see the water gleaming outside from here, the fireweed that grows just under the crack outside of her room, the little dots of people coming to celebrate them. The sunlight burns around her, and Mipha turns her back to it with her eyes solely on Zelda.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You come here </span>
  <em>
    <span>now</span>
  </em>
  <span>, and expect me to wait for this again until the afternoon?” She presses a hand to Mipha’s fin, the one the bracelet hangs lopsidedly from, and she stays still for her with a smile that sets her teeth glimmering white.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“How will you hold me then?” she asks, smile bright in her glowing amber eyes. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“With all the love and strength that I can give,” Zelda swears, as earnestly as if she were already on the altar. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Mipha’s lips on hers is a matching promise enough.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Full disclaimer: i have been to one wedding in my entire life. It turned out not to be a real wedding.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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